Solar Eclipsed
by bigfatcarp93 mk2
Summary: Set fifty years after Mass Effect 3, when the Galaxy is within the grip of a corrupt, controlling organization known as the Mandate. Follow agents of the Mandate as they scheme, murder and coerce, some in the interest of peace, some in the interest of power. This fic written cooperatively by bigfatcarp93, thebobmaster and Garjel blah
1. Chapter 1 - Valaris

_Mess. Disaster. How to spin this, I wonder?_

Zelaria Cetari rushed back to her apartment on the Citadel Presidium, ignoring the panicked crowd that seemed to alternate between rushing to the bomb site and running away from , the crowd seemed to simply flow around the slender woman, almost as if they didn't notice her. More likely, however, the crowd simply took her as one of their own, another person caught badly off-guard. What had happened, however, was all too obvious to Zelaria.

She should have seen it coming. Having a well oiled machine was easy, if all the cogs were small and local. Once the machine grew, expanded, it was all too easy to lose track of a cog, or have a spanner drop somewhere and blow the whole thing to smithereens. Much like the Council chambers, actually.

No time to panic, however. Zelaria was in damage control mode. If this was a machine, there were flames somewhere, wreckage, but machines could be fixed. This situation was no different. Shame about the Council, but they were replaceable. As was anyone who dared to break away from the group, as this Eclipse had seemed to do.

Activating her comm station, Zelaria leaned over, clearing her voice before speaking in a rather high-pitched voice. "This is Nasari," she said quietly, dropping her handler name as a way to ensure that someone recognized the urgency of her call enough to not overlook it. "In case you haven't heard, there has been a disturbance on the Citadel. One which, I might point out, was NOT sanctioned by anyone other than a splinter group. If we don't get a handle on this immediately, we are going to have some significant problems. Should I return to base?"

xXxXxXx

At a station orbiting Casses, Zelaria's call was received, and immediately understood. The man on the other end had, of course, already learned of the situation. Zelaria was far from the only agent he had working around the galaxy. That made his next decision a lot easier to handle. "Of course, Nasari. Return to base immediately. We will be waiting for your report, as well as your new assignment."

Once the call was disconnected, the man sighed heavily, shaking his head with annoyance. _This is only a temporary setback. I still hate setbacks._ Pressing his intercom, he gave a message to his secretary. "You know who I'm waiting for. Send them in."

A tall, wiry human with red hair and a bushy red beard entered the room. He wore black tactical gear and a sniper rifle slung across his back. "Harding. But I think you already knew that. How can I help?"

The man behind the desk stood up, looking over Harding quickly. "How you can help remains to be seen, but your task is simple...in theory." The rather fit, muscular human crossed his arms behind his back, pacing back and forth as he spoke. "In case you have not heard, there was a bombing on the Citadel Presidium. To be precise, the bombing was at the Council chambers. The Council was in session, and the councilors themselves are missing, presumed dead, along with quite a few diplomats."

"The problem is simple. We did not authorize the bombing, but someone who we were supposedly working with was responsible. My agent, who we will call Nasari, was close on hand, and saw several Eclipse armors just before the blast. These Eclipse were wearing full armor, including helmets, making it impossible to identify them. However, Nasari was able to plant a tracking beacon on one. The problem is, Nasari is an agent, a valuable one. By no means irreplaceable, but if we are going to track the beacon down from her signal, she will need some muscle backing her up. That is where you, and possibly others, will come into play."

Harding unshouldered his rifle and checked it over. "Number of possible hostiles? What am I wading into here?"  
The man sighed. "The number of hostiles, as well as what you are getting into, depends on how large this rogue group is. Nasari's initial report indicates that there were 6 Eclipse on site. She's on her way to this station as we speak. Her first-hand account should be able to give you a bit more data."

Harding met the man's eyes. "Well then."

He snapped the rifle's bolt.

"I guess all I need to know is where to plant my boots."

"Nasari has the tracking data. She offered to send it, but that would simply cause problems if it were intercepted. It is fine and all to encrypt data, but the best encryption is an agent keeping the data close at hand when feasible. As it is, any direct attack will likely have to wait until Nasari arrives at the station with the data."

The man smiled slightly. "Of course, that shouldn't take too long. Nasari's ship is quite advanced, so she should be here quicker than you'd expect."

"Alright. Guess my boots are right where they belong." Harding took a seat.

After a bit of waiting, a tall, slender figure walked into the room where Harding and the man were sitting. Nodding slightly towards Harding, apparently friendly despite the body-concealing armor and helmet they were wearing, they placed a datapad on the man's desk.

"This is everything I know about the incident, as well as the attackers," Nasari said quietly, but loud enough for Harding to hear her as well. "For the sake of my...ally, I suppose I should summarize. I spotted three males, two females, and one unknown leaving the site quickly just before the bombs went off. From the way they were acting, I found them suspicious, so I placed a tracker on the female turian. The males were two humans and a krogan, with a female krogan and a salarian joining them before splitting off.

As I could not pursue, I simply made my way back to my apartment, filed my report, and came here. Any questions...?" She turned around to face Harding, head tilted slightly as she waited for a response. Harding thought for a while, staring down at his weapon. "Female salarian and krogan... rare. Strange. Don't like it. When you say "unknown..." You couldn't make out the sixth? Did you have any visual at all?"

Nasari sighed slightly, shaking her head. "I apologize. I was unclear. The krogan was female, but I couldn't make out the gender of the salarian, hence the 'unknown' gender. Believe it or not, even a salarian generally needs to have more than just a body build to go off of to determine another salarian's gender. Whatever the salarian was, they had some sort of armor on, concealing everything about them other than their build."  
"Mmm. Salarian's on the down low," said Harding. "I.D. unclear. Don't like that either. No, sir-ee. Don't like it. Anything else I need to know?"

Nasari shrugged, holding up her omnitool briefly. "I'm still waiting for the turian's signal to settle down. She seems to be jumping from port to port right now, making it hard to get a fixed location. Other than that, I suppose you should know about your partner." Stepping back, she held up a gloved hand, which proceeded to glow dark green. "I'm a biotic salarian. There aren't many of us, and most of us are encouraged to work intelligence, which is how I ended up here. I tell you this to make one thing clear: I can handle myself most of the time, but I shudder to think of the political fallout if I were to be badly harmed."

Hammond scratched his beard. "Mmmm. Also rare. I like it, though. And don't worry: if there's a problem, I'll just fix it. Sound good?"  
Nasari chuckled slightly. "Assuming the problem is that easily fixed. It rarely is in my line of work." As her omnitool beeped, she glanced down at it. "How interesting. The turian has landed on a planet by the name of Valaris. It's a pleasant enough world, but nearly abandoned. The only things there are factories, meant to remain out of the purview of the Council. Similar to Noveria, but with a much nicer climate, and not even the pretense of corporate care."  
He stood, shouldering his weapon again. "Are we to head out, then?"

Nasari nodded quickly, moving out of the room. "Yes. If you have a ship you'd rather use, feel free to go to it. However, my ship is quite big enough for the two of us, with room to spare."

xXxXxXx

After a surprisingly quick flight, Nasari landed on Valaris, stepping out of the ship quickly. The area where she had landed the ship was well-grown, with several dark purple bushes and trees near what seemed to be a rather rapidly moving river. On their side of the river, within view, was a factory, although not one that seemed to be currently active, given the lack of movement.

Standing by as she waited for her partner, Nasari double-checked the tracker's location. It still indicated the turian was inside the factory. That made Nasari nervous. Salarians liked having the jump on the enemy. Confronting one was supposed to mean that she had already won. _That bombing has changed quite a lot._

Harding stepped out leisurely, taking in the sights. He eyed the factory.

"Should have landed on the other side of the river. Once we're across, want me on the roof?"

Nasari thought carefully, looking at the factory steadily, before shaking her head. "I think we would be better off getting to the factory first. I should be able to gauge their defenses then, and decide the best course of action. It's tempting to split up, take a two-sided approach, but if one of us encounters more resistance than we expected, that could be a problem."

With that, Nasari crossed the river quickly, the stream no deeper than her knees. Stumbling slightly as she got out on the other river bank, she laid down on her stomach, moving slowly for a few seconds before stopping entirely. Frowning, Harding took a moment to remove his socks and unshoulder his weapon before following. He joined her on the cool ground, leveling his rifle at the facility. "Strange..." said Nasari, "there's movement, but only a little. Either everyone is further in the base, or this place is extremely under-guarded."  
"I count... four outside? You?"

After some further focusing, Nasari nodded, standing. "That's all I count. Four guards. Two on the roof, one at either entrance. Of course, that implies that we'd be foolish enough to use the doors, rather than the windows."

Timing her movements quickly, Nasari moved up to the factory, avoiding the eyesight of the guards on the roof. Harding waited behind, watching her advance. Once there, she looked through a window, then placed her hand on the wall. Lightly enough to not be heard, but moving enough for Harding to observe, she tapped the wall once. _She's there. Alone. I really don't like this._

He gave a small thumbs up, before pointing to his rifle, then to the roof guards. He mockingly held his hand to his ear, indicating that he was waiting for a reply.

It seemed he wanted to know if he should snipe them or not.

After some thought, she shook her head. _No need to draw any more attention than necessary._ Quietly, she placed a hand on the window, focusing as the window was surrounded by a dark green glow, promptly followed by the glass pane simply floating out of the frame and settling on the ground silently.

Harding rose to a crouch and moved over to join her, fast and low. "You know, you could have just walked in through the front door." The turian spoke suddenly from the window, not looking over at the pair as Nasari froze slightly. She wasn't very far inside the building, and they could see and hear her just fine. "After all, my guards are there to keep people out I don't want to find me."

Harding, now only three meters away, froze in mid-step for a moment, before snorting with laughter. "You got fuckin' had," he helpfully told Nasari. Nasari sighed, standing up fully. "I don't think so. I just think my tracker was noticed."

The turian raised her talons, clapping slowly. "Congratulations. You've figured out how I knew you'd show up. Next question is, why didn't I simply disable the tracker? The answer is because I wanted to see who they sent after me. And it seems I got the salarian biotic and...well, whoever your partner is." Turning around at last, the turian was unarmed, and fairly muscular, with deep purple facepaint to indicate her allegiance to Eclipse.

Harding shrugged. "Just a guy who's wondering how much manpower you're willing to lose to kill us if you try.

...Because it would be a lot. Several dudes. Now, I think you don't want to try that, at least not yet. But I just want to make sure you know where we're standing. You can finish sizing us up and order us dead... but you will drop first, and then I will kill at least your two favorite guards." He smiled jovially and opened his arms, as if for a hug. "Now let's negotiate!"

The turian chuckled, raising her hands in mock surrender. "I told you, these guards are not meant for you. They are meant for others. That I want to keep out. I thought I made that clear. As for negotiating...Something tells me that's not what this is about."

Nasari shook her head. "You're right. This is about the Citadel bombing. We know you were there. We want to know who else was. Their names. Where they are."

The turian sighed, resting her hands on the table in front of her. "Well, that will be a problem. You see...If I don't tell you, I'm dead. You or your gun nut friend will take me out, even if I return the favor on one of you. On the other hand...telling you will kill me eventually."

"Well now if you're so convinced we're going to kill you, why not use the guards for us exactly?" Harding asked, stroking his beard.  
"Because I feel that you should know what you are up against by coming after the bombers. Besides, I didn't say you would kill me. I'd say that if you wanted to, you'd be able to do so regardless of what I try."

"Smart gal." Harding turned to Nasari. "Alright, now what boss?"  
Nasari groaned, clearly frustrated. "I don't think we have much choice. She's not going to tell us anything..." Nasari suddenly glowed dark green, grabbing the turian and pulling her out the window and tossing her onto the ground, pinning her down. "Not here, at least. We'll have to take her with us."

Groaning, the turian looked up at Nasari and Harding. "You should think real carefully about that. I'm not saying you leave me here, and I definitely would rather live. But you see...I'm not the one in charge, and all things considered, I'm pretty small-time. My boss, my...master, if you will...he's the big game, and you do not want to fuck with him."

"Hmm..." Harding said pensively, drumming his fingers on the barrel of his rifle. "Y'know it's interesting. Everybody has an opinion on what you look like." He spoke to the turian. "My employer here is telling me you look like a target for capture. You're telling me you look untouchable. I disagree with both." He turned back to Nasari. "You know what I see when I look at her, boss?"

He drew close, whispering in Nasari's ear so the turian couldn't hear. _"I'm seeing bait. Use the little fish to draw in the big fish. She stops reporting in, her employer sends someone to check up."_

Nasari nodded, whispering back. _"I agree with your idea. I just think we should make sure we know what we are getting into."_ Kneeling, she grabbed the turian by her wrists, standing her up. As the turian tried to pull away, Nasari pinned her hands down with her biotics. "You are coming with us. Tell me more about this master of yours. Tell me what to expect."

The turian laughed, but not out of humor. Instead, her laugh was hard, quite cynical. "What should you expect? Well, he's a turian, some of the time. He's much, much worse if he's pissed off. Either way, you should expect to get fucking slaughtered, along with everyone in your base if you even _think_ of leading him there."

"Well... perhaps you're exactly the person to talk us through setting a trap for this butcher of yours. Your life may well depend on it."

The turian chuckled, shaking her head. "My life is fucked anyways if I let you two take me into custody. It's forfeit at that point, and he'll be happy to collect. As for a trap, you'd better have an army of specialists, with a lot of heavy weapons and men to sacrifice, because that's what it will take. A trap to ambush him will just piss him off."

Glancing at Nasari, she smirked just a little. "He'll like you. He likes the small ones."

Harding raised an eyebrow. "Maybe you're right, and we are hunting a tiger with a slingshot. Or maybe you're exaggerating, or even lying, to throw us off." He faced his boss again. "I would still suggest that a decent trap - on our home turf, with a large number of reinforcements and sufficient intel - could handle anything. But if you have another play in mind...?"

Nasari sighed softly, placing a hand on her forehead as she thought about the situation. "If we need more intel, that will be tricky. We don't even have a name to go off of. Just...Master. That's hardly a name. 'Oh, Master! I know exactly who you are talking about. He's based out in the Orion System.'"

Harding chuckled. "Well, we have all the intel we need right here," he said, indicating the turian. "She hasn't weighed her options yet. If Master really is so guaranteed to kill her, then she has a better chance, no matter how small, of survival if she helps us take him down." He gave her a sideways glance, as if challenging her to correct him.

The turian sighed, looking at the ground. "You actually have a point, for someone who doesn't know what he is getting into. I'll tell you what I know, although it isn't much. As I said, I was pretty low on the totem pole. This was my first real big job, and the first time I even saw him. Now, tell me, what do you want to know? His name? Because I only ever called him Master. He didn't like me calling him anything else."

Harding smiled, and kneeled in front of her. "Let's start with the basics. What can he do? Weapons? Biotics? Tech? Does he travel with bodyguards?"

"He's more of a tech person, I guess. And he has no bodyguards, most of the time, because he doesn't need them. As for weapons, his favorite weapons are his bare hands. He loves strangling. I don't know what it is about that, but if he has the option, he will straight-up choke anyone who's upset him. He does have...other weapons, though. When he gets pissed off, and transforms...he can fire off this laser beam, obliterates people."

Nasari rolled her eyes, sighing. "Forget it, Harding. This bitch is going to say whatever ridiculous thing comes to mind. She doesn't want to say shit, because she wants us off-guard."

Harding narrowed his eyes and stroked his beard, genuinely unsure whether to believe her or not. It was quite fantastic, but she had little reason to lie. "This laser... describe it in more detail. Appearance, sound?"

The turian closed her eyes, thinking carefully. "It's big...bright red beam. There's a sort of roaring sound when it's fired off. I don't really know how to describe it further."

The turian grunted as Nasari kicked her flat, pinning the turian to the ground with a foot on her chest. "We don't have time for your fucking bullshit! Either tell us the truth, or we'll have to find someone who will!"

"Actually..." said Harding, "I know my weapons, and that sounds a bit like a Tha-" he stopped before he said any more in front of the prisoner. "Tell the truth maybe... don't like that, though. Mm-mm, no, don't like that at all. Alright, moving on. These are augmentations in his body? I assume unmagnetized and EM resistant? Would be nice to have a target with such easy weaknesses, but seems unlikely..."

The turian groaned, but responded to Harding's question. "Heavily augmented, and they are definitely resistant to electromagnetic pulses. Magnetization in general...I can't say for sure, but I highly doubt he'd overlook that major of a weakness. He's very fond of proving stronger than others, of being better than organic...Although he does have a soft spot in a way for the female species. Not much, but I've known him to get a little distracted at times."

Harding thought this over carefully, stroking his beard. His eyes seemed to light up suddenly, as though an idea had occurred to him. "Boss, I think there's a lot we can do with this, and a lot more we can learn from her... but it's getting cold out here, and it's very exposed. Her guards could spot us. I say we rustle her back up to base, and continue this there. It should buy some time before this fire-spitting turian comes after us. Time to set our trap."

Nasari growled slightly, but stepped back, pulling the turian to her feet. "We'll get an ID on you, girlie, while we take you back to the base. You'd better start thinking of some hard truths to tell while we are on the way back." With that, Nasari forced the turian to march across the river, putting her on the ship.


	2. Chapter 2 - Betrayal

Once on the ship, while scans were running to identify the turian, Nasari simply relaxed against the wall, letting the ship pilot itself for the time being. She didn't want to get back to base until she knew who they had. Would look better in the report.

Harding entered, now out of his armor but still fiddling with his rifle. Sighting his employer, he gave a smile and sat down. "She wasn't lying. Thought you'd want to know."

Nasari glanced at Harding, her voice quiet. "How can you possibly believe her? That her boss is a transforming turian who shoots lasers?"

"She's describing a Thanix cannon. I know my weapons. It's Reaper tech. Very dangerous, very rare. She'd be unlikely to have experience with those. Besides, no one lies in this business who isn't better at it. Like you said, her story's ridiculous. Not the kind of thing she'd make up if she wanted us to believe it, eh?"

He stretched and cracked his fingers. "Listen, Boss, interrogating her is going to be tedious work, and your time is more important. Let me handle it, and you can focus on getting in touch with the higher-ups and trying to bring in more backup; put those leadership skills to work. We'll need all the guns we can get to capture this Master fella."

Nasari nodded slightly, heading towards the cockpit. "I'll do what I can. It will be a tough sell, and if what she says is true...Well, I'm going to do what I can. You make sure she doesn't leave anything out. Your people skills were helpful when we were under watch. Here, though, we need to get everything out of her. Quickly."

He gave a quick little salute. "Yezz mam!"

He set off to find the turian captive.

The turian was in a small room, clearly designed as some sort of secret stash area for smugglers. To make sure she wasn't a danger, given the lack of bindings, she had been stripped and had any weapons removed, only allowed to put her underarmor back on for a slight amount of decorum. Seeing Harding enter the room, she leaned against the wall. "Here to keep me...company?"

He pulled three crates over, sitting on one and putting his rifle on another. "Sit," he said cheerfully, indicating the third. He hit the release on part of the weapon, and began to disassemble it.

"You feel powerless? You have more power here than you realize."

Cautiously, the turian sat on the third crate. "Do I? Even if I was able to take you two down, I'd still have nowhere to go now."

"Oh, no. You have the strongest position. You see, how much solid, reliable information you give me about Master - and how much you help with the trap - directly correlates to your chances of survival. It's all up to you. You give me _everything_ , we capture Master and you live. Don't give us enough, and he will kill you. You seem very certain of that."

He began to clean the barrel. "But of course, you have no way of knowing we won't kill you. So what if I had a way ensuring that? What if I could put us both in a position where we were almost guaranteed to need and want each other alive? What if, instead of captive and captor, you and I could be partners? Eh?"

He held up the barrel and peered through it. "Y'see, I have a plan. Or rather I have three plans. And if you do your part and give me what I need, all of them involve you surviving and working by my side."

The turian tilted her head slightly, looking at Harding intently. "I can tell you what I know about Master, but I can't guarantee your success at capturing him. My question, however, is quite simple. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that I'd be willing to work with you, become your partner and work by your side. What do you get out of it? A traitor turian? What do I do for you that Nasari can't?"

"A co-conspirator, of course! I'll need an extra pair of eyes and hands, someone I can rely on, once I'm done killing Nasari, or at least ousting her, and taking her position as my own." He stroked his beard. "Oops. Spoilers."

He started cleaning the scope. "You see in this position, with me one more rung up the ladder and you as my right hand, you'd only be useful to our employers as long as I was there; you'd have every interest in helping me stay safe and in power, because if my duplicity were ever uncovered, they'd obviously get rid of my right hand woman as well." He waved the scope at her. "That's you. Here, let me break the three plans down for you:"

While cleaning the firing pin, he explained the first plan: "Scenario one assumes nothing goes wrong. On the surface, we use you as bait for Master. But in reality, we put Nasari in your place. Master kills her, we trap Master and deliver him to the higher-ups. Nasari was unfortunately killed by an enemy operative, but I - or rather, my hand-picked right hand and I - managed to capture that extremely important enemy operative and deliver him to the bosses. Easy promotion, and no-one's the wiser."

While cleaning the mass effect core, he explained the second plan: "Scenario two assumes Master doesn't kill Nasari, but we still capture him. We damage the ship enough to make it look like the whole thing was an unmitigated disaster; you and I captured the enemy operative, but Nasari takes the blame for everything that went wrong. I can invent a story about her mismanagement of the situation, and you can corroborate it. We look good, she looks bad, I get her job."

While cleaning the ammo block, he explained the third plan: "Scenario three assumes everything goes wrong and we can't capture Master. You and I just escape and leave Nesari to deal with the mess or, more likely, die. My employers will likely assume I died as well, and they don't even know that much about you. There is the possibility that Master hunts us down to the ends of the Galaxy, but from what you've said I think he's a bit too unfocused and brutish for that."

He began to put the rifle back together. "Thoughts, partner?"

The turian chuckled slightly, leaning back as she got more comfortable on the crate. "Now...there's an enticing idea, and I can think of plenty of ways to ensure Master does the dirty work of taking out Nasari for us. My thoughts, however, are currently focused on one thing. You are quite eager, and willing, to take Nasari out. Why should I trust you to not do the same for me in the near future?"

"Because you are neither my enemy nor a superior. Which gives you very good incentive to continue being neither of those things, yeah?" He held up the perfect gun. "Aw, now look at that. Take care of something proper, and it'll never work against you."

The turian smirked slightly. "So, what do you need to know in order to make sure that the trap is right for Nasari?"

"What will incentivize Master most? Once he's here, what will his priority be? Does he have any weaknesses you can think of? Does he have superiors, and if so, what do they do to keep him in line? And most importantly..." Harding smiled. "If you had to guess... how much does he _weigh?"_

"He's a brute, plain and simple. He's not the highest up on the chain, but his superiors basically keep him in line by giving him direction." The turian crossed her arms, smiling coldly. "As for his weaknesses, I wasn't lying outside the factory. He really does like the females, and one as small as Nasari...let's just say having her in the room would be enough to draw his attention. Assuming, of course, that the quarian was a case example. As for weight...I couldn't say. He felt like he was at least 300 pounds when he was pinning me to the ground, but being choked isn't exactly good for focusing on minutiae."

"That's very good. We convince Nasari to hide on the Engineering deck, near the mass effect core. We direct Master down there, while we hide in the Cargo bay with the shuttle. If all goes well and Master kills Nesari, we ramp up the mass effect field for the artificial gravity in there so that he gets pinned and can't move. Afterwards, the story will be that we didn't realize he would head down there, and we only figured out how to open up on the core like that after it was too late and Nasari was already dead. If things go wrong, we're already near the shuttle and can escape. I'll tell Nesari that she's safest on Engineering because it's shielded and, according to your intel, Master has some kind of advanced scanner he uses to track his victims. You be sure to corroborate that if she asks.

Nesaria will think the plan is to lure Master down to the shuttle bay and vent both you and him into space. We can also lie that his modifications will allow him to survive out there, so we can still capture him alive. Now, we'll need a good engineer to help us with the core. Know one?"

Thinking carefully, the turian smiled widely. "That sounds like quite a plan. And it doesn't even require me to lie that much. The best kind of trap is one you can set without being too dishonest." Reacting instinctively, the turian extended a hand for Harding to shake. "Let's get this bitch taken care of. Just Harding and Vintoria heading up the ladder. _Such_ a shame about Nasari."

He smiled and shook her hand vigorously. "Ah, go ahead and call me Dillon. Partner."  
Vintoria gripped his hand tightly, pulling him closer to her. "Dillon, I know a snow job when I hear one. Just keep this in mind. If you try to take me out like Nasari, you will regret it. I am more than happy to work with you in any respect, but I am no tool to be used, then tossed aside."

He raised his eyebrows. "Well. Probably shouldn't have been working for Eclipse, then? Look, I have no intention of getting rid of you so long as you never get in my way. Like I said before: don't ever become my superior, or my enemy. And remember that I need you. Having a capable lieutenant already with me makes me seem more useful to the higher-ups, and like the most efficient possible replacement for Nesaria."

Vintoria released his hand. "You don't actually need me, but that's just fine. Being a partner with you seems safer than any other options. Now, here's the tricky thing. If Nasari is expecting us to confront Master at the base, how do we convince her to get to the mass effect core of this ship?"

"Easy. I make a case for doing it here instead, with out little fictionalized version of the plan. Tell her that you've told me Master is modified to live in space and scan for his prey, check. Tell her we can vent him from the shuttle bay, exploiting an obvious weakness that we won't be able to anywhere else, check check. Convince her that with his scanning abilities, the only safe place for her is the mass effect core, check to the third power. I even already have an excuse in mind for us needing an ace engineer all of a sudden."

Vintoria stood up, stretching slightly. "Well, then. I think we have our plan. Apologies for looking ahead, but after Master has...taken care of our little problem, what sort of partnership do you intend to have? Is this an equal partnership, a professional one...or something else altogether?"

Harding stood up as well. "All I need is a lieutenant. Which I imagine you can do far better for me than you have for Master; I won't choke you nearly as much. Now, I must go and share the good news about how cooperative you've been. Sit tight for now."

Vintoria leaned against the wall. "Go ahead, then. Set up our little trap. Shame that only we know who it is for."

Harding strolled off, but he didn't head straight for Nasari; whistling Peer Gynt to himself, he headed for the cargo bay.

In the bay, he looked around to ensure that he was alone, and then made a beeline for the shuttle. Still whistling, he pried off a maintenance panel and carefully examined the insides. He noted a very large, central component; he was unaware that it was known as an ignition coil, but he could tell it was removable, and he guessed it was probably crucial. He jogged across the room to the engineer's supply cabinet and opened it up, finding an identical-looking component; a spare coil. He took the spare and pocketed it, closed the cabinet, and ran back over to the shuttle. He drew his gun and rifle-butted the coil a few times, damaging it severely in a burst of sparks.

He replaced the panel and left. When the skeleton engineering team came, they would find the shuttle inoperable, and their replacement part missing; a better engineer would need to be called in order to repair the craft.

Hurrying to his bunk, he carefully placed the coil in his case of thermal clips, hidden under the clips, and placed the case under his cot. He would need to remember that it was here, just in case. With that done, he hustled off to the bridge to meet up with Nesaria, carefully pacing himself to ensure that he wasn't sweaty or out of breath when he arrived.

"Hey, boss. I've got good news and bad news."

Nasari looked at Harding warily. "Don't keep me in suspense. Just tell me everything you can. I have my superiors breathing down my neck to get this Master business settled quickly."

"The good news is, we have a way to trap Master. A weakness we can exploit. The bad news is that we'll have to do it here, on the ship."

He quickly ran down the fake version of the plan: let Master board the ship, place Vintoria in the cargo bay as bait, position Harding near the bay, place Nesaria in the mass effect core chamber where she'll be safe from Master's scanning abilities, wait for Master to enter the bay, Harding seals him in, opens the bay and vents both Master and Vintoria into space. Master survives, they can immobilize him with ease and pick him up whenever they want.

"It'll take a little time to set up and go over the plan again, and make sure everything and everyone is in place, but it will work. And we have time; it'll take Master longer to track us here and board."

Nasari thought through the plan quickly, before nodding slowly. "Two birds with one stone. We capture Master, take out the turian. Then, we can hopefully track down the other bombers. I'll make sure to let my superiors know the change in plans."

xXxXxXx

In the meantime, Vintoria was on a comm call. "We need you to my location. Where is that?" Reaching to her clothes, she activated a tracking beacon. "Signal A456E1137. Find it, and get here quickly. Master won't be far behind you, and you need to get here first."

xXxXxXx

Later, Vintoria patiently waited in her "cell" for the engineer to board the ship. Her connections through Eclipse made finding one fairly easy for her. Now, she just needed to explain the plan, and execute.

xXxXxXx

As the engineer's craft landed in the cargo bay, Harding paced, thinking. This was one wild card in the plan; he had no idea who the engineer was, but he needed to get them on his and Vintoria's side for the plan to work. There was nothing else for it: the engineer needed to be in on the plan.

The engineer, a violet asari, stepped off the shuttle and greeted Harding. "Delia. Vintoria called for me. I understand you have some tech problems?"  
Harding shook her hand. "That's best explained by Vintoria herself. I'll take you to her."

He led Delia through the ship to Vintoria's room and led her in. "Vintoria?" she asked. "Why are you... in a cupboard?"

Vintoria smiled slightly. "It's been some time, Delia. The short version of a long story is: I was captured due to a connection with that bombing on the Citadel. Harding here offered me a way to turn it to my advantage. You know my master, yes? Well, we need your help to capture him...and take out Dillon's superior. Well, you won't be doing the dirty work. That's Master's job."

Delia stared at her with a slightly glassy, dopey gaze as she spoke, mouth hanging open a bit. Once the explanation was done, she waited a moment before simply saying:

"...'Kay. So what do I do exactly?"

"How long would it take you to rig the mass effect core room as a high-gravity trap?" Harding asked, "specifically, to entrap a 300-pound being without killing them?"

"Four hours?"

Harding stroked his beard. "Alright, that tightens the timetable. There won't be time for you to repair the shuttle. In that case, you'll need to quickly walk me through replacing a crucial part for it, and then get to work on that trap."

"Alright. And once the trap is set?"

"Once the trap is set, I'll be making sure that Master tracks us down. Once I ensure that, it will be up to Dillon to make sure Nasari is in the mass effect core room. Once she and Master are in the same room, you will seal it off, and spring the trap. Sadly, you'll be just a little too slow to save Nasari."

Delia thought for a moment, staring at the floor.

"...So I need to seal the trap?"

"Right," said Harding.

"Meaning I need to be near Engineering."

"Right."

"In Master's path."

"R... hm. Okay. I see your point. We'll need to find you a hiding place, somewhere where Master won't find you as he's looking for Nasari. Don't worry, I know every inch of this ship, I can find something for you, before you get to work."

He turned to Vintoria. "Think Master's already on his way? How much time do you think we have? We need at least the four hours and change."

Vintoria thought carefully. "He's almost certainly on his way by now, since I didn't report in. Factoring the time for him to assume I was late, followed by tracking me down...We have 4 and a half hours. Max."

"Then we'd best hurry. Vintoria, wait here until I signal you that he's about to board, and then head down to the cargo bay. Delia, come show me how to replace that part; I'm going to need to retrieve it, so you'll meet me back there; and then I can start to arrange everything."

"Yessir."

Harding and Delia left.

xXxXxXx

Over the course of a few minutes, Harding hustled around the ship: collecting the ignition coil from his bunk, meeting Delia in the bay, and learning how to replace the coil came first. He then sent the asari down to the core to begin working on her modifications and spent several minutes replacing the core, before heading to the bridge again to report in.

"Hey boss, I'm getting final preparations ready for the trap. Master should be here in a few hours. The engineer already fixed that busted shuttle, and I sent her down to the core to buff up that shielding to protect you from his scans. Wish I could join you down there where it's safe..."

Nasari responded quickly. "Just try to keep yourself safe, Harding. This Master may be a tough opponent if he gets a chance to jump you."

"I'll do my best. You should wait until he's about to board before you head down to the core, we don't want you tripping over the expert. In fact... do you mind if I go check in on her? I want to make sure she's not foolin' around."

"Go ahead, Harding. Just make sure things go according to plan."

In the meantime, Vintoria was watching Delia work, listening intently for unexpected sounds that could indicate Master boarding earlier than expected.

Harding arrived, and raised a brow at Vintoria. "You should be staying out of sight. Awfully suspicious of Nasari sees you. How's it going, Delia?"

"Fine." she didn't look up from her work; she had a panel open on the wall and was typing in a small console inside. "You find my hiding place yet?"

"Look left." Delia looked, seeing a sleeping pod. "There's a cavity behind the pod, very dark. I thought about hiding some contraband in there once, never got around to it. You're just small enough to squeeze in; once Master passes you by, you can hurry and squeeze back out to seal the trap. But _don't do so until you hear Nasari die, clear?_ We need plausible deniability."

Vintoria started to head back to her "cell". "Nasari's still in the cockpit. Also, how do you hear someone being strangled?"

"Well..." Harding muttered darkly, "I imagine she'll stop screaming."

4 hours later, Vintoria was in her cell, patiently waiting for the plan to come to fruition. She'd spent quite some time thinking the plan over, looking for holes. The truth was, the only thing she could see going wrong was the mass effect field not being enough to pin down Master. Even then, however, Vintoria would be alive, and Nasari would not. That was all Vintoria could hope for.

xXxXxXx

In the cockpit, Nasari half-sat, half-stood at the controls, her eyes fully focused on the radar. The minute, the second she saw a ship she didn't recognize, she was sounding the go-ahead for the plan. She had her doubts, not sure whether the mass effect core would truly protect her. Still a safer bet than being in the open, though.

A reading appeared on the sensors. 'Vessel not found in database' was not a common error message aboard this ship.

The small blip on the screen signifying this new ship didn't seem to be moving at all. It hung in space, conspicuous in its namelessness.

And then, just as suddenly as it had come up, the signal vanished.

Nasari was quick to take note of the blip. It was probably just an error. Probably. Still...

"All right, I got something on the sensors. It's gone now, but unless my systems are glitching, which is highly unlikely, we may be getting boarded soon."

With that warning, Nasari made her way to the mass effect core as planned, barely taking the time to put on her body armor and helmet on the way.

xXxXxXx

Vintoria chuckled softly to herself, standing up and rapidly making her way to the docking bay, as arranged. One thing she did that was not arranged for, however, was toy with her omnitool. _Time for Nasari to make her exit. It's a shame I can't watch it happen...but I can make her an even more tempting target._

Once at the hangar bay, Vintoria waited for Harding to arrive, assuming that Delia was in position.

xXxXxXx

Back in the empty cockpit, the sensor screen flickered, and once again the unknown vessel appeared - now several lightminutes closer. From it's tiny representative blip, two smaller, even more conspicuously innocuous blips broke away, advancing slowly at first but with ever-increasing speed towards Nasari's ship...

An alarm rang out, alerting the crew to a pair of approaching spaceborne missiles.

Nasari sighed softly. _Damn it. Should have known there wouldn't be a conventional boarding technique._

The first missile was absorbed by the ship's shields. The second, however, hit the ship directly.

The missile detonated, not with a conventional blast, but an EMP. Everywhere in the ship the lights abruptly shut off, only to be replaced seconds later by soft red back-ups. The everpresent humming of that every healthy ship should possess dwindled, as the main generator's deactivated... Along with, a few moments later, the mass effect core, now only spinning with only enough power to provide a basic gravity to the crew.

The silence was so deafening, that even through the muteness of vacuum, you could almost hear the unnamed ship approaching.

xXxXxXx

Harding was already stationed near the cargo bay, and held his hand near an intercom panel, ready to execute the most crucial part of the plan: tricking Master into going to the Core.

He flinched as the lights went out. His plan was in trouble.

"...Shit." Only certain systems on the ship were EMP shielded, and the intercom was not one of them. He would need to find a different plan for luring Master down to engineering, or scrap Plans A and B and switch to C. He thought quickly; the doors still worked, which allowed for something.

He began hurrying down to the Core.

xXxXxXx

Having finished with her upgrades several minutes before, Delia followed the plan, slipping into the crawlspace to hide. Even Nasari wouldn't see her.

She froze in terror as everything went black. She stopped herself from making any noise, and simply sat in the darkness.

xXxXxXx

As the red lights came on, making the light extremely dim, Nasari reacted quickly. Heading to the nearest generator, still inside the mass effect core, she quickly began to hack into it, in order to do a hard system reset. While it would take some time, more than enough for any potential boarders to make it on through the suddenly open shuttle bay doors, Nasari was able to reset the systems, and restore power.

Harding reached the door to the Core, and saw Nasari inside, hacking the genny. She hadn't seen him yet; he thought quickly. Looking to the side, he saw the pod that was hiding Delia's crawlspace. He quickly tried to worm his way in, difficult in his armor. Inside, Delia heard something coming in. He shrank as far back into a corner as she could, placing a hand over her mouth to muffle her fast, terrified breathing.

As soon as Harding was in, he whispered to her. _"Hey, you in here? It's me."_

She gasped in relief, nodded, then realized he couldn't see her, so she whispered _"Yes."_

xXxXxXx

Vintoria quickly ducked behind some stacked crates, in case Master came in through the now-open doors in the shuttle bay, rather than boarding through the escape pods. Once there, Vintoria simply waited and hid, searching for an empty crate. Finding one, she ducked inside, listening carefully.

A dull banging echoed through the hull, as clamps affixed themselves around the shuttle bay doors. A rushing sound, as the space just outside of them was pressurised. Footsteps.

Then, a horrendous grinding squeal filled the shuttle bay, as six synthetic fingers forced themselves through the seal in the external airlock, and gradually heaved the metal bulkheads apart. A pair of red eyes peered in through the widening gap.

"Honey..." growled a mirthless voice. 'I'm home!"

Music began to play from within the intruding ship, echoing through the corridors and rooms; an instrumental of "Prologue/Look Down" from "Les Miserables."

The door pneumatics suddenly gave, and jolted apart, allowing the abominable turian entry to the shuttle bag. Master rolled his shoulders and stalked aboard the ship, looking about slowly.

"Nobody in?" he asked, before taking a deep breath. It was almost as though he was smelling the air.

Gritting her teeth to remain silent, Vintoria got to work, hoping that Master couldn't detect her inside the crate. Sealing it silently, to leave her in pitch-darkness, Vintoria activated her omnitool, the metal crate preventing the light from leaving the crate and making her detectable. As she did so, she began quickly tapping into the systems, which she'd gained access to a couple of hours prior.

When Nasari activated the systems again, she'd find that the lights wouldn't activate...at least, not all of them. The lights leading from the shuttle bay directly to the mass effect core, however, worked perfectly well. Vintoria grinned at the thought of her captor finding a lit arrow essentially pointing directly to her.

"Vintooooriaaaa..."

Suddenly Master walked over the the crates, grabbing hold of one of the largest and pulling it onto its side, where it crashed down right next to Vintoria. He did not open it, however; instead he dragged it over to the ajar shuttle bay doors and wedged it into the gap. He did this twice more - at one point even giving Vintoria's crate a small shove to test its heaviness, but apparently deciding that it wouldn't do - until the exit was effectively barricaded to anyone without decent biotics or a forklift.

"Vintoria!" Master repeated, louder this time. "I'm going to give you one chance. Come forward now, and I promise you that the trip home will be far less... Uncomfortable than you'll find otherwise. One chance..."

 _Ah...fuck. This is not going to end well._

As her crate was nudged, Vintoria flinched slightly. Not enough to make a sound, but she knew it had been a close call. At Master's chance/threat, she hesitated. It would be so easy to just give herself up. But no, she'd had enough of that, of taking the easy way out. She'd take her chances, hope the lights would activate quickly, soon enough to distract Master and lead him to new prey while she worked out a plan B to escape.

Just then, the lights reactivated, leaving a lit path to the mass effect core. Whether it was enough to adequately distract Master...that was another concern.

Master whipped around as the lights flickered on.

"Hmm. Trying to restore power." he mused, stalking off into the ship. "There's no escaping me now, Vintoria, you know that. Is it the other crew? They'll soon learn..."

With that, he was gone from the shuttle bay, following the lights down into the ship's depths.

After Vintoria heard Master's footsteps fade away, she let out the breath she had been holding in a rush. Trembling slightly, she activated her omnitool again, this time signaling Delia with a text message. _Master is on his way, following the lights. Be ready._


	3. Chapter 3 - Enter Master

Nasari flinched as the lights turned on, turning to face them. She didn't realize, due to the layout, that the other lights on the ship weren't activated, but she knew that this Master would be trying to track down the source of the power surge. _I should still be safe. Assuming the mass effect core does, in fact, keep Master out. If not..._ She flared her biotics, facing the entrance to the core.

Delia's tool blinked on in the darkness, startling her and causing her to make a small squeak. Harding quickly grabbed her arm to settle her down, and checked the message. _"Will you be ready to lock him in?"_

 _"I... I think so."_ she said.

Master continued through the ship, moving through the ruddy metal corridors like a shark through open ocean. He followed the lights, until he came to a doorway where the restored lighting was abruptly dominated by a blue glow; the entrance to the mass effect core room. The spinning rings of the core had slowed to a crawl, making only an empty whooshing sound with every pass. He slowed his footsteps to a predatory stalk, silently sidling up right next to the entrance and listening.

Nasari stood by the door, taking cover on the other side. With how quietly the core was spinning, her breathing seemed louder to her than normal, and was certainly audible on the other side of the door. Carefully, she looked around the corner, to see if Master was indeed there.

A glittering metal hand snapped out from the shadows and fastened around the salarian's spindly neck, quick as a striking snake. Master bodily pulled Nasari out from the core room, slamming her against the wall opposite the door and leaning in close.

"The turian..." he demanded menacingly, red eyes boring into her own. "Where is she?"

Nasari gasped as the hand grabbed her by the neck, pinning her to the wall. Even through her helmet, she could feel Master's gaze burning into her. Grimacing, she shook her head slightly. "In the shuttle bay..." she managed to choke out, before flaring up her biotics and hitting Master across the face with a superpowered punch, one that would have broken her wrist if it wasn't mostly cartilage.

Harding began typing on his Omni-tool very quickly. Turning his back towards the pod to hide the light, he prepared to send the following text message to Vintoria:

"get out of shuttle bay now"

xXxXxXx

Vintoria received the text message, and her response was brief. "Done."

Crawling out from the crate, Vintoria stumbled out of the shuttle bay, making sure to leave a different way than Master had as she made her way down the hallway. Stopping about halfway to the cockpit, she knelt down, removing an access hatch and crawling inside, sealing it behind her. Now beneath the floor, Vintoria crawled slowly, following the bowels of the ship towards the blue light. If Master was there, she wanted to see it.

xXxXxXx

Master staggered back into the core room entrance, massaging his jaw.

"Wow..." he mumbled through a slackened mouth. "Ah, you're not the typical squishy salarian, are you? How interesting."

Nasari panted for breath. Stepping forward, she stayed silent, before hitting him with a biotic charge, knocking both of them into the core room. Once inside, she grabbed him to pin him down. "I could use a little help in here!" she shouted over her omnitool.

This was not the case.

Master gripped Nasari's forearms, yanking down hard as he butted his forehead hard against hers. The headbutt made Nasari stagger backward, her helmet cracking from the impact. He then pulled out of her grip, seizing her by the breastplate and tossing her away from him. He leapt to his feet with unhampered agility. Nasari suddenly found herself rolling on the floor, groaning as she hit the wall hard. Leaning against it for support, she forced herself to her feet.

"So what did uppity little bitch tell you, hmm?" Master asked. "What do you know?"

"I don't know much of anything. My partner's the one who interrogated her. I was told that you were big...that you liked them small...and that the mass effect core output would shield me from detection. Clearly, that wasn't all true." Nasari shook her head slightly, trying to flare up her biotics, but thanks to the headbutt, she couldn't quite focus, resulting in an intermittent dark green glow around her hand.

"Let me guess, you're talking about the big part, aren't you?" Master jeered, grabbing Nasari's flickering hand and squeezing uncomfortably, pinning it to the wall above her head. "Am I a little shorter than you were expecting, lizard girl? Ha ha..."

Nesari struggled as Master effortlessly pinned her to the wall. "Technically, I'm an amphibian," she said through gritted teeth, slamming a knee up at Master, albeit without the force of biotics behind it, only her rather slight muscles.

There was a thump as her knee impacted against Master's armour. He winced, and with a growl of rage slammed his free fist up into Nasari's stomach.

"Still pretty squishy after all." Master spat, taking the salarian's other hand and cramming it up next to the one he already had pinned.

Nasari gasped as he punched her in the stomach, her breath rushing out from the blow. With both of her hands now pinned, she continued to struggle, groaning from residual pain due to his punch. "I think even Vintoria's squishy next to you..." she finally managed to mutter.

"Heh, you'd better believe it." Master said slyly. "Now, you want to know the reason why you're still alive?"  
Nesari shuddered noticeably. "I can think of two reasons. One: I'm bait of some sort. Two: You like them small."

"Actually neither of those things right now." Master admitted, as though even he was surprised by this. "No, the reason why I haven't killed you is because something just feels... Off. Wouldn't you agree, lizard girl? Seems to me like you've been played somehow, and I don't like feeling that I could be next."

Nasari nodded slightly. "The thought had occurred to me. Although I insist on reminding you, I'm not a lizard. Lizards drown, for starters." Nasari tilted her head slightly, looking Master in the face as best as she could from her current position. "So the question is simple. What's next? If you aren't going to kill me, there is no reason to leave me pinned. I'd say it would be in your best interest to get back on track, which is Vintoria. Wouldn't you agree?"

As Nasari spoke, she felt herself recover from the beating she'd received so far. It was a bit slower than most soldiers, but she was ready for her biotics. Not that she would let Master know that.

Master gripped Nasari by the chin, forcing her head back against the wall, and somehow managing to constrict her jaw even through the helmet while his other hand kept a firm hold of her wrists.

"I'm the one asking the questions, _lizard_ girl..."

Taking Delia by the wrist, Harding led her out of the hiding place. He had wanted to wait and spring the trap after Master killed Nasari, but it was taking too long, and there were too many variables now. This wouldn't be difficult to spin, especially since the trap would kill Nasari.

He pointed to the panel, giving Delia a stern look. Taking the hint, she worked the circuits, causing the door to close and lock, trapping Master and his quarry inside.

As the door closed, Nasari froze up slightly, mumbling through her achy jaw as her helmet cracked further. "I think you were right about this being a trap, but I don't think my death was necessary for it."

Wordlessly, Master tossed Nasari aside. He marched intently back to the now-sealed entrance, and kicked at the door.

On the other side, Harding saw a small dent bulge suddenly out from the metal door.

"Do it now!" he shouted at Delia.

"Uh... o-okay!" She began working as fast as she could, typing several commands. The mass effect core began to hum loudly, and a saint blue haze appeared in the core room. There was a sort of pressure in the room, a stiffness. For Nasari, it was becoming very hard to move.

Nasari groaned, crawling slowly around the mass effect core. Holding her breath to make it easier to steady herself, she raised a shaky arm, launching a biotic pull at the generator. With that pull, she managed to dislodge it, powering the mass effect core back down to emergency status. Of course, the other problem was still inside the room with her. With the power out, the door was sealed shut, and she knew that she was locked up with a dangerous, and now quite angry, turian.

Vintoria climbed out of the safety hatch on the other side of the door, glancing at Delia and Harding. "Do either of you have a back-up plan, or should we use mine?"

Harding looked at her with a furious and puzzled expression.

"Backu- I had _three_ plans, remember!? And they all got screwed over! Not liking this, not at all... what are yours?"

Vintoria sighed softly, shaking her head. "My back-up plan? Waiting until Master deals with Nasari, have you two hide back in your cubby-hole, and ask Master to let me stay here. I can't guarantee he'll let me, of course. He may want me to go back with him. At least this way, you two can get away to think of a plan...D? I think it's D we're on?"

Harding looked back at the dented door, then at her. "I doubt you can convince him of anything at this point."

Nasari shrugged. "You never know unless you try."

xXxXxXx

Inside the room, Nasari began crawling across the floor, as rapidly as she could manage after nearly being crushed. Soon, she found what she was looking for: an access hatch. Quickly, she began to open it. _30 seconds._

With a savage, synthetic-tinged roar, Master slammed his fist into the door, creating a second dent.

"Is that you, Vintoria?" he called out. "How about you open this door, introduce me to your other friends. Nasari and I had a good chat just- Hey!"

Nasari heard approaching footsteps behind her.

"Did I give you permission to crawl back under your rock, _lizard girl?"_

Nasari quickly tried to dart into the escape hatch, reaching down to hit a button just inside the access hatch three times in case Master managed to catch up to her. Master's hand snatched through the hatch, attempting to lock around the salarian's leg. Nasari gasped, trying to pull her ankle out of Master's grip as she desperately launched a biotic throw behind her.

Master let out a snarl, his grip slackening somewhat as his body was buffeted by the throw. Pulling her leg from his grip, Nasari panted before continuing to crawl through the access hatch, unable to move quickly due to the tightness of the space.

Master ducked partially into the vent, refastening his grip on Nasari and pulling her in one smooth motion from the hatch. Once she was out he quickly put her into a headlock, squeezing tight. Not tight enough to kill, but enough to cause unconsciousness.

"No." he told her quietly. "You stay..." He dropped the salarian, and crawled back into the hatch. "...I go."

xXxXxXx

Vintoria heard Master's movements inside the mass effect core, and heard them grow fainter as he moved into the hatch. Grimacing slightly, she glanced at Harding and Delia. "Time for my back-up plan, it seems. Fix the generator, if you can. Just in case this doesn't work out." With that, she headed back to where the access hatch had let her out, assuming Master would get out the same way. _Time to face Master, it seems._

Having been listening to the terrifying sounds coming from inside the core, Delia twiddled her hands nervously. "Um... yes, I suppose I can do that... how do we get in?" 

While continuing to wait for Master, Vintoria replied. "There should be some sort of access panel that you can use to restart the power. At that point, it's just a matter of getting Master back into the room. I'll handle that part."

"Right... okay... ship this class, the panel..." she whirled around, and pointed to a low section on the wall. "There!" She hurried over and started working.

Vintoria stepped a bit closer to the access panel, but still far enough away so that she wasn't in arm's reach of Master when he emerged.

xXxXxXx

In the meantime, Nasari stirred after Master had choked her out. Keeping quiet, she simply moved towards the access hatch, listening to make sure Master was out of range before crawling through.

xXxXxXx

Red eyes appeared within the dark hatch's interior. Shining fingers followed, gripping either side and pulling. With a fluid, unnatural motion, Master slid from the hole and onto his feet, barely letting it break his stride as he stalked towards Vintoria.


	4. Chapter 4 - Exit Stage Left

Vintoria simply stood still, her eyes on Master. "It's been some time, Master. I apologize for being out of touch, but as you can tell, I was a little busy."  
Harding ducked away, taking cover at a nearby corner and unshouldering his rifle, making sure he had room to retreat if necessary. Ideally, he was hoping Master hadn't even seen him.

Master, as is his want, grabbed Vintoria by the throat.

"It doesn't do to make your Master crawl!" he hissed, before throwing her down to the floor.

Vintoria sprawled on the floor, not getting up right away. "I apologize for that, truly." Standing slowly, Vintoria continued staring at Master. "Just as I apologize for what I'm about to ask. I can't go back with you. There's too many opportunities here...opportunities for both of us." Approaching Master slowly, she smiled slightly. "Do you want to hear more?"

"You'd best choose the words," his hand snapped out a second time, but rather than grabbing Vintoria roughly by the throat, his fingers instead lightly held - almost caressed - her cheek, "that leave your pretty mouth carefully, little bird, because you are on thin fucking ice."

Vintoria nodded slowly. "I know I'm on thin ice. Why do you think I was hesitant to approach you earlier?" Reaching up, she gently stroked the back of Master's hand. "After all, it's hard to get my point across when you are gripping my throat. My point being...Have you ever thought about how to improve your standing? You only have a few bosses...but what if you could have even fewer?"

"Then I suppose you'd have fewer as well." Master mused. "What a coincidence!"  
Vintoria chuckled softly. "I never claimed I'd be doing this just for you, Master. It's just that what benefits me benefits us. Taking me back, though...Well, that wouldn't really be helpful in the long run. Unless you want things to stay just as they are? The dog sent to fetch?"

"He he." Master chucked, withdrawing his hand. "Crack, and-" he lashed out in a savage backhanded slap, '-SPLASH! I think we've heard just about enough from you, forewoman. Now are you going to come quietly, or will I have to start _breaking things?"_

Vintoria staggered sideways into the wall, using it to support herself. "Master, please listen to me! I'm only trying to help us both, but I can't do it by going back with you!"

"So your plan was to defect, without telling me; summon an engineer, without telling me; hide on the ship when I inevitably track this engineer, without speaking up on my arrival; then set up a biotic salarian to ambush me, and lock me in a room with them, so that you can help _both_ of us?"

Master walked slowly towards Vintoria.

"You and I have played games in the past, my little bird. But if this is one of those games to you, then you _really_ should have known better. You play with fire so recklessly, then you're going to get burnt."

Vintoria straightened as best as she could. "I couldn't tell you about defecting or the engineer, because our bosses might find out by intercepting messages. I didn't speak up when you arrived, because I was honestly hoping you'd kill the biotic salarian. If I didn't think you could handle her, I'd have killed her myself."

Once he got closer to her, she reached out, running a hand briefly over his hip. "This is no game. Nothing about power is a game. I've been reckless, but I always thought you liked that in a girl. As for playing with fire...that is how passion runs, is it not? Red-hot?"

"Is that what you are?" Master asked, glaring down at her. "Reckless? Passionate? Well that's not what you look like to me. No... Desperate is what you are. But I'll admit, if there's anything I like in a girl, it's a bit of desperation."

Master seized Vintoria's hand, twisting up and as he pulled her along behind him.

"We're leaving. You try to run, I break your leg. But first, you're going to open up the door to the core room, and I'm going to retrieve your lizard girlfriend. She will need to be questioned."

Vintoria groaned, letting Master drag her along to the door. Sighing, she opened the door without protest. "Go on in, then."

Master stepped inside, and by a stroke of luck only dragged Vintoria just through to the other side of the doorway. His red eyes flashed as he saw the vacant space where Nasari had previously lain.

"Shit..." he muttered.

Vintoria quickly ducked outside of the mass effect core, pulling her arm free and closing the door while Master was distracted. "NOW!" she shouted to Delia and Harding.

Delia ran forward from her hiding place and hit the panel, sealing the door. She quickly began typing at the controls, trying to reengage the core and spring the trap. The blue haze returned to the room.

Vintoria staggered back from the door, running to the access hatch to seal it. However, when she got there, she found a surprise, as Nasari crawled out of the escape hatch, having hidden while Master and Vintoria were having their "talk". Before Nasari could do much more than gasp, Vintoria pinned her to the wall, grabbing the salarian by the throat and squeezing, bashing her rhythmically against the wall to keep her off-balance and avoid using her biotics to get out of her stranglehold.

"Shit!" Master repeated, as the gravity slowly increased. He managed to land one final, resounding blow against the door, splitting it by a crack so that blue light poured back out into the corridor, before he was pulled to his knees.

He managed to shuffle up to the core railing and latch on, holding himself up as the core endeavored to crush him.

While continuing to choke Nasari, Vintoria spoke over her shoulder. "Harding, how are we getting out of here? The shuttle bay's a bit blocked off, thanks to Master."

"I should be able to figure that out, give me a moment. Delia, with me." Harding and Delia left, while the gravity finally maxed out, strong enough to pin a three-hundred pound being.

Strong as he was, the weight of Master's body was soon so strong that the metal bars of the railing were creaking and sagging beneath him, dragging him closer and closer to the floor. Master groaned, the organic parts of his face sagging under the g-force. He glared at the stilling-accelerating mass effect core, his red eyes flashing maliciously. His mouth sagged open, distending.

Hearing the groaning coming from the mass effect core chamber through the crack in the door, Vintoria raised her voice for Harding to hear. "I hope you have a rather good idea! I did warn you about his super-weapon, didn't I?!"

Harding turned around and, surprisingly, smiled at her. "Oh, I would warn him not to use that in there if you were him. I don't think he'll like what happens. Big boy needs to research his own weapons better."

He turned back and kept leading Delia away.

Vintoria gritted her teeth, but didn't respond, instead trying to focus completely on choking the life out of Nasari, hoping that whatever Harding was planning would work, and trying not to consider the possibility of Master firing off the Thanix Cannon.

xXxXxXx

With the dreaded drone of a Reaper, Master's gullet flared red... Only to disgorge a stream of red ooze over the railing, missing the core entirely and splashing onto the bottom of the core chamber. Master watched the ooze melt rapidly into the metal floor, assisted by the massive gravity close to the core. His face made no discernible expression - he could barely move his organic muscles in this gravity. Slowly, the railing he was leaning on sank closer to the ground, while elsewhere other objects began collapsing under their own weight.

Due to her close proximity to the chamber, Vintoria was the first to feel the floor shifting underneath her after Master's efforts. "We have a problem here! He let out the Thanix!"

xXxXxXx

A high trill emerged from speakers all over the ship, causing Delia to jump in panic. "What was that!?"

Harding sighed in annoyance. "That... would be the fire alarm. Very important to have on a spaceship, yes. Yep. The big bastard tried to use the cannon. Go get Vintoria and tell her to come back here, quickly. Go!"

Delia ran back and relayed the message, while Harding stood near the panel to control the doors. Before the breach could occur, he would seal the door. For Delia and Vintoria's sakes, they needed to hurry.

xXxXxXx

Vintoria growled, but tossed aside the still alive, but barely conscious, salarian before sprinting for the exit. "Fuck! Two more minutes, and she wouldn't have been a fucking problem!" she shouted, making her way to the shuttle bay.

"Well... in a few seconds, she won't be!" said Harding as the ladies passed him. He sealed the door (compartmentalizing that part of the ship and allowing anyone in there to die while saving anyone not) and followed, heading to the bay.

Arriving in the bay, Harding stopped a moment to catch his breath. "Alright... you two, get in the shuttle and wait for me. I'll be only a moment. Don't close the door."

He ran over to a corner and opened one of the smaller crates, pulling out a smaller white crate from within with a red hazard stripe on it.

Vintoria nodded, heading onto the shuttle without any further comment. It still bothered her, not being there to finish off Nasari. _Fucking lizard._

xXxXxXx

After the door sealed behind the trio, the molten metal from Master's mouth did the trick, breaching the hull in the compartment and sucking much of what was in the compartment into space. Unfortunately for the barely alive Nasari, that included both her and Master, and her smashed helmet ensured that her spacewalk was a terminally short one.

xXxXxXx

Inside the shuttle, Vintoria heard the sound of items getting spaced. "Let's get out of here," she said to no one in particular, considering the pilot was still working outside the ship to clear a path.

Harding had wedged the crate between two of the larger ones Master had used to build the barricade. Smiling, he seized his rifle and headed back to the shuttle. Getting behind the open door, he lay down on his belly and aimed his rifle at the small crate of explosives. "I _said_ I'd get to shoot something today..."  
"No you didn't," said Delia from inside the shuttle.  
"Well... I sure as hell thought it."

He shot the crate, blasting the barricade apart. Some shrapnel hit the door and the shuttle, not damaging it but proving that they were right to follow his directions and get in. He stood back up and began sauntering over to the opening to Master's boarding craft. "Well stale my bread. It worked."

"So...are we taking Master's ship? Or are you just moving the thing? Because this shuttle will have to hold the three of us, and the currently floating out in space Master. Think it's big enough for that?" Vintoria looked around the shuttle. "Because I'm not sure."

"If Master's alive - which, despite his appalling social skills, I truly hope he is - we can stash him on his ship, and disable its functions. Good thing we have an engineer. The three of us will wait in the shuttle until Nasari's bosses come to find us. And do please let me do the talking; I know these people, and what to say. They'll be quite suspicious of a known enemy agent."

Vintoria nodded slightly. "You have a point. I wasn't planning to say 'Hey, by the way, I, the enemy agent, survived, while your agent, Nasari, is floating out in space. Funny, that." Leaning back, Vintoria closed her eyes a bit. "I still wish I could have strangled her. It would have been easier to pin that on Master."

Harding raised his eyebrows slightly, taking note of her vindictive side. "Well, let's get to work. We still have a lot to do."

"Alright," said Delia. "After all that stress, first thing I'm gonna do is go-"

"You're going to board Master's ship and go pick him up."

"-board Master's ship and go pick him up. And after THAT I'll finally be able to just-"

"Disable the ship as quickly as possible and return here, stranding Master where we can easily get to him."

"-do that. After which I'll get in the shower-

"The shuttle."

"-The shuttle. With you two. And wait."

"Yep."

Vintoria closed her eyes fully, relaxing surprisingly quickly given her recent experiences. With her eyes still closed, she spoke somewhat quietly. "Where do you think they'll put Master? Someplace secure, I hope."

He smiled again. "The people we work for - I don't know all the details, but they've got some pretty big silver spoons, if you catch me. If there's a prison out there that can hold him, they own it. If not, that's a problem for later."

Vintoria chuckled softly. "You know, Master is a good source of information, if we make sure the prison is somewhat accessible. He might still talk to me."

Harding suppressed his smile at that. _Better he talk to you than ever find out about me._ "Yeah... might be somethin' we can do with that at some point. I'll let you know."

Vintoria sighed softly at that. _Wouldn't be the first time I've done something involving Master._ Out loud, she decided to ask a question. "Dillon...Did my trying to strangle Nasari personally trouble you at all?"

He smiled big again. "'Course not! Having that kind of passion on my side makes me feel safe! I know you'd use it to watch my back as long as I watch yours!" He playfully punched her on the arm.  
Vintoria chuckled softly. "I am quite loyal, as long as my loyalty is rewarded. I trust that you can do just that. I don't like being used too much. That's why I couldn't stand Nasari. She saw me as nothing more than a means to an end."

"Well, like I told you the second time we spoke: you and I have every reason to keep each other safe, and no reason to betray each other."

xXxXxXx

Delia headed onto Master's boarding craft and disengaged it, the auto-shields protecting Harding and Vintoria as the doors shut.

The ship was... Creepy.

There was a stasis pod leaning against the wall near to the cockpit, and several containers of suspicious fluid opposite that. Similar to the ooze Master had disgorged, but not glowing and superheated.

Delia tried not to pay too much attention to her surroundings as she took the controls and navigated outward. With the ship's small size, the sensors could easily pick up Master, as well as Nasari's body.

Hovering the ship right over Master, Delia did a scan to try and find out if he was alive, or, if he was, exactly _how_ alive he was.

At first, nothing was detected... Then came a resounding pulse on the sensor. Followed by another one some time later. Then another one.

Master's heart was still beating, stably at that, but ten times slower than normal for a turian.

Nodding in satisfaction, Delia stood up and began preparing, setting overload systems all over the ship and preparing the escape pod. Once she was ready, she set the airlock to pull Master in and cycled it, dumping him onto the deck of the ship. She looked at him cautiously for a moment, and then began setting her program off, frying most of the ship's systems, including engines, weapons and scanners, nearly beyond repair. As sparks flew and smoke fizzled, she began hurrying to the pod, not knowing how long it would take Master to wake.

xXxXxXx

In the meantime, Vintoria glanced at Harding. "You wouldn't happen to have any sort of restraints, would you? It might look a little better if I were restrained."

"Oh, I think we'll be fine. It fits better with the lie I came up with that you're walking free. Don't worry, I can handle this."  
"If you say so. I'll trust you on this. You know these people, I don't. Speaking of knowing people, have you thought about the next step after taking over for Nasari?"

"We'll get to that. There will be work to do, and plans to make, but we won't stop here. I also need to go off on my own for a bit, attend to some personal business, but that shouldn't take more than two days. And it can wait until we've settled things here."

Vintoria nodded again. "I'll be making plans of my own, but I'll make sure that they don't interfere with official business."

xXxXxXx

Delia managed to evacuate just fine, leaving Master stranded in a derelict vessel. Once she made it back to the ship and reported to Harding, he went to the bridge to contact Nasari's superiors, whom he had never spoken to before.

He activated the bridge comm-linking, using the channel that he knew Nasari used. "Hello, this is Nasari's second-in-command, Dillon Harding. Nasari is dead and we have an extremely dangerous high-ranking enemy operative in custody. Please respond."

After a brief pause on the other end of the line, a female voice spoke over the line. "This is The Chameleon. Can you confirm Nasari's death? Is her body recoverable?"

"Potentially, yes. She was spaced after a severe physical assault."  
The Chameleon sighed on the other end. Just slightly, but still audible. "Shame. And we are sure that this enemy operative is fully secured for pick-up?"

"He's trapped inside a derelict vessel with limited life support functionality. Retrieving him will be a chore, but he'll be weakened. The operative in question is very heavily enhanced; he can tear through a bulkhead door bare-handed, and has a Thanix cannon in his mouth. He can also survive being spaced."

"He's definitely a threat, then. I'll make sure to have a crew retrieve him that can keep him under cryo-sleep, and we have resources to keep him secured past then. We'll also need to send someone to discuss Nasari's death in person...and what that means for your role in this organization. Do you have a location, or some method of transmitting your location remotely?"

"This ship has a long-range transmitter, which I am activating... now. I await your agents' arrival. Incidentally, there's another, now former, Eclipse member on board. Though originally taken as a captive, she proved instrumental in capturing the main target. Without her contribution, it's fair to say that this operation would have failed. I'd like to both request and recommend that she be treated as an ally by whoever you send. In my personal opinion, she may prove very useful."

"My agents, as well as the retrieval team, are now on their way. I'll trust their judgment when it comes to your former Eclipse ally. If she is truly useful, I'm sure we can find a good place for her." With that, The Chameleon disconnected.

Exhaling in relief, Harding leaned back and put his feet up on the console. "Alright. Hard part done. For now."

Vintoria entered and looked over at Harding. "Talking over a console was the hard part? I'd think that trying to convince someone your new ally has only the best intentions and that you totally didn't set up your leader to be killed in a personal conversation would be trickier."  
"Well, yes." Harding admitted. "It will be difficult, but getting a lie past a Mandate Operator is harder than any of their agents. If we can manage that, we can manage this."

xXxXxXx

After a while of waiting, another ship pulled up to Nasari's, with two teams boarding. One team, a group of four elite operatives, boarded Master's ship to subdue and transport him. The other team, or rather, duo, walked up to the shuttle. "Dillon Harding?" the turian called out, rapping on the shuttle with one fist. "Time to debrief."

He opened the door, and gave a toothy smile. "Why hello gents!" There was just a hint more of his usual cowboyish drawl in his voice. "Welcome aboard!"

The male turian folded his arms, the female human next to him simply watching for the time being. "Pleasure. Now...I'm not sure if you could tell over the radio, but Chameleon is a bit displeased that Nasari is dead. Was there no way you could save her?"

"Unfortunately, no. She was cornered in the core room with Master - that's what we call the target. I wanted to get in there and save her, but my sniper rifle wouldn't have done much in close quarters. Vintoria here and I came up with the plan together, to seal the area off, and when Master started trying to beat his way out of the doors, I decided to have Delia, our engineer, use the core's artificial gravity to pin him down. Then he, ah, spaced himself. Didn't understand his own weapon too well."

The turian sighed softly. "Damn shame. Nasari was a strong fighter, and an extremely rare one. Still, that isn't your concern as such. Onto the next topic. This...Vintoria. Are you sure she can be trusted? From what you say, she did help capture this Master. The fact remains, however, that she is former Eclipse. Helping you was likely helping herself."

The human spoke up, continuing with the turian's train of thought. "Would she be willing to help you in a scenario that doesn't necessarily benefit her in a survival sense? By that, of course, I don't mean to imply sacrificing her life. Merely that her helping you in this case _was_ saving her life, rather than any altruism, any sense of self-improvement."

"Oh, I wouldn't worry about her. She's a sweet kid, I reckon she wants to do right by those that do right by her, you know?"

He leaned in a bit and spoke softly. "She trusts me now, you know? It wouldn't sit right not doing everything I can to keep her on the right side. Our side. Sir."

There was an idea he hoped to plant in their heads as he said this: _She trusts me, and owes me. Only me. She's useless to you without me._ Of course, he also tried not to let on that he was planting that notion intentionally. If all went right, they would come up with this idea 'themselves.'

The turian frowned slightly, at least as much as a turian could frown. "'Sweet kids' don't join Eclipse. Or our organization, for that matter. Still, if you can keep her in line, make sure she doesn't sabotage us, I don't see the harm in letting her stay with you for the time being. If she does...you'll be held responsible."

"Understood very much, I appreciate it. Though that does bring me to my question, if you don't mind - who's going to take poor Nasari's position? We can't do much out here without leadership. You sending a replacement?"

The turian shook his head. "To be honest, Chameleon's running overtime trying to cover up Nasari's death. A female salarian? Rare. A biotic salarian? Rare. A female biotic salarian? Almost unique. There would be a rather large uproar on the salarian front if word got out, and that's not something we want. For that reason, it falls to you to pick up where she left off."

Harding blinked in surprise. "...Me? I'm not entirely sure I'm qualified, I've always been a bit more of a follower... but I suppose if I had the right people with me, I could manage?"

The turian sighed. "Yes, you. You are the only real option, if we are to keep Nasari's death under wraps. The fewer people who know the real circumstances of her death, the better. Bringing in new blood to take over as leader would lead to questions about what happened to the old one."

"I suppose that does make sense... that's why you guys get paid the big bucks, good ideas like that!"

He laughed, and then looked around a bit. "This ship is going to need repairs, by the way. Permission to bring it to dry-dock?"

"Granted," was the immediate response. "We'll give you a boost there with our ship, if it is necessary." Harding gave a smile, and returned to his quarters to await the journey.

Vintoria joined Harding shortly after the two crew members left for their ship, her eyes fixed in a glare on them for a few seconds before doing so. "It seems you managed to pull off everything. The position, the power, and the girl."

He smiled and waved a dismissive hand. "Ah. You make it sound like more than it was. We have what we were after, but there's still going to be work to do. We'll be expected to take on Nasari's mission, and find your cohorts."

Vintoria chuckled softly. "If only you had one of the bombers to track down the others. Oh, wait! You have their on-the-ground leader on that task! How fortunate for you."

"Funny, that. Almost like I planned it. But I'm just a sniper."  
Vintoria smirked slightly. "According to them, you didn't plan a thing. You just happened to be in the right place, in comparison to poor Nasari's wrong place."

"Yeah, poor Nasari... Anyway, I suggest you enjoy the downtime. We're docking to get repairs, during which, as I said, I'm going to take some personal time. After that, we go hunting."  
Vintoria nodded. "Sounds fair. I trust I can get an upgrade in the quality of my quarters now?"  
"Heh. Well... I don't believe Nasari's are occupied at the mo'."

Vintoria chuckled softly. "One last thing. What do we do with Delia? I don't know if she can join us on a permanent basis."  
"Oh, I have a good feeling about that one. Let's keep her around for a while, see how it goes. We need good staff, and I'd certainly rather keep the person who knows what we've done here where we can keep an eye on them."

Vintoria sighed in relief. "Oh, good. I was afraid you'd consider her a loose end. That would be a shame." With that, Vintoria headed to Nasari's recently vacated quarters.

xXxXxXx

While the debriefing and promotion of Harding was underway, the four-man squad searched Master's ship for the turian. The squad consisted of a krogan, two turians, and an asari.

The four-man squad was pleasantly surprised to see the stasis pod on the ship. "Makes our job a lot easier," the female turian commented, as the krogan lifted Master's form and carried him to the stasis pod. The male turian opened the pod, sealing it after the krogan placed Master inside, with the female turian activating it. Finally, the asari carried the stasis pod to their ship with biotics.

As the ship left, it attached to Nasari's, now Harding's, ship with what were essentially mag-hooks, pulling it along to the dry dock on-base over the planet Casses.


	5. Chapter 5 - Dry Dock

After placing Harding's ship in dry dock, the agents' ship was guided to another dock, one that emptied to a lower area of the base. There, Master's stasis pod was moved to a secure cell, placing the massive turian in a cell with heavily reinforced walls (they'd been tested against a krogan drunk on ryncol, then reinforced until they didn't so much as crack), as well as an energy shield that proved able to render the same krogan unconscious after headbutting it, due to the energy discharge.

xXxXxXx

On Harding's ship, Vintoria simply lazed about. She had a communicator on board, which was all she really needed. She didn't want to go make nice with any of the new people in her new organization. That was Harding's job. She was simply there as the muscle and intel, in her mind.

She received a call from Harding. "Alright, I just finished putting Delia in charge of repairs. I'm taking the shuttle out for a bit. You're in charge while I'm gone."  
Vintoria smiled slightly. "I'll make sure the ship is still here when you return, Dillon."

xXxXxXx

Harding switched off the comm and allowed himself a moment of quiet, closing his eyes and sighing. He had done a lot today, and there was a lot more to do. After taking his respite, he gathered his things and boarded the shuttle, setting a course and taking off.

After he left, Vintoria made a call to a friend. Well, acquaintance.

"Hello, Besint. It's been some time since the Citadel. Where have you stationed up?"

A deep chuckle rumbled from the other end of the line, the krogan clearly amused. "Vintoria. Still not one for small talk, I see. Always straight to the point. I'm somewhere that isn't the Citadel, that's all you need to know."

"Really, Besint? You are going to play that game? After all I did for you? After everything I let you do to me to impress that...Nari, was it?"

"You couldn't have stopped me if you wanted to. Nari would have been impressed either way. I'm still not telling you where I am. How's that arm treating you, anyways?"

"It's treating me fine. Can't you tell?"

"That was quite rude, Vinty. What did I ever do to you?"

"Nothing. That's exactly the problem. I've done plenty for you, but I ask for one little location, and all you give me is crap. Can you at least tell me where Cersina is?"

"Cersina? That slippery one? I doubt even he knows where he is most of the time. I'm pretty sure I left him sitting on the Citadel. For all I know, he's still there."

"Is there anyone you can point me to, or am I going to have to ask Master? I doubt he'll be happy I'm taking up his time."

There was a long pause before Besint replied.

"Nari's on Omega. If you hurt her, I'll know. And when I find you, you'll learn I was holding back."

With that, Vintoria disconnected the call. "Delia! Was I connected long enough for the trace to work?!" she called out over the intercom.

"You should be fine!" she radioed back.

"Good! We'll let Harding know as soon as he gets back!" With that, Vintoria relaxed in bed once again, waiting for Harding to return from his personal matters.

xXxXxXx

On his journey, Harding changed outfits, finally removing his armor and, after spending a relaxing few moments sitting buck-naked in the craft, donned more casual clothes: a pair of old-fashioned jeans, a simple white dress shirt and brown vest. The Earth look. He had just finished lacing up his combat boots and carefully stowing his gear when he arrived at his destination.

The shuttle touched down on a barren, arid part of a moon; it was bright and hot out, the middle of the eight-hour day. A gas giant dominated almost a quarter of the otherwise brilliant blue sky. He stepped out, his boots kicking up dust, and breathed deeply, thumbs in his pockets. The air was artificial - the result of terraforming - but it invigorated him nonetheless. Smelled like home. He hiked away from the shuttle, and walked for nearly half an hour before he finally saw the structure in the distance: a simple wooden one-story house, with faded white paint, solar panels on the roof, and a large, but mostly barren, garden. He approached the house, opened the gate, and started up the gravel walk towards his home, the rocks crunching below his feet.

Halfway up the path, he paused, his nose scrunching up as he concentrated. Something was wrong... too quiet...

Harding looked around the garden; only a few bushes continued to live, and the yellowish grass. The once-thriving rhododendron bushes were dry and skeletal. He marched out across a section of the yard to one of the bushes and stared down into it.

He watched the bush do nothing in silence for a long while. There was a tense stillness in the air, the only sound being the distant wind and the occasional insect. Then, slowly, Harding's face began to change. He rolled back his eyes, scrunched up his face, and let his mouth hang open and lopsided, his tongue rolling out to one side. He held the expression for several seconds, before a low, stifled giggling sound began to emerge from the bush. Smiling, Harding shot both of his hands in and pulled the small girl out; a sun-bleached yellow dress, freckles, and hair as red as his, laughing as she was suddenly yanked from her hiding place.

"How'd you know, Dad!?"  
"Too quiet coming up the path. You weren't breaking anything." Smiling, Harding balanced the girl on his hip and began towards the door. "You and Kyle playing hide and seek?"  
"Well, we were..."  
"Hey now. You sass me, I'll never get you that pony."  
She rolled her eyes. "But I don't want a pony. I told you that."  
"Hey, that's good, hide your true motives, keep me guessing!" He set her down at the door and tickled her for a moment, earning another giggle before he opened it up an stepped in, relieved at the cool. _Good, the air conditioning made it to the end of the month... There's one expense I can't wait not to worry about..._

As Dillon and his daughter entered, he called out: "KYLE! Get out here!"  
The scrawny blonde man of about twenty stood up from behind the couch. "Mr. Harding! So good to see you home! Peggy and I were playing hide and seek."  
Harding fixed him with a confused look. "Why were you both hiding?"  
Kyle looked equally confused. "Was... was she hiding? I thought..."  
Peggy laughed. "No, it was my turn to hide!"  
"No wonder it was taking you so long to find me..."  
"Hell's bells, boy! What do I pay you minimum wage for?"  
Kyle laughed. "Well... since you're home, let me fix up dinner!"  
"Aw, no need for that, son. Let me get you your fee and you can head on home. Your mother's cooking is gonna be better for your belly than anything we have around here."

xXxXxXx

Hours after sending the babysitter home and having dinner, Harding tucked his daughter into bed.  
"Did you have a good week at work, Dad?"  
"I surely did, Candy Corn. In fact, I got a promotion."  
"Really? Does that mean you'll make more money?"  
"It surely does. I don't want to jinx it, but I may be able to start paying Kyle more, and maybe get you a few of those things you've been asking for."  
Peggy's eyes lit up. "Like a dog!?"  
Dillon laughed. "Sure, Candy Corn, we can talk about a dog. You dream about that tonight, alright?"

He stood up, and walked to the door. Before he turned off the light, he looked at her one last time. "Remember, I'll always keep you safe, Baby Girl. Good night."  
"'Night, Dad."

He shut off the light and left, walking to his room and muttering to himself. "Always keep you safe... even if I have to take over the whole goddamned Galaxy to do it..."


End file.
